


Wish Upon A Witch

by Ankala



Category: Original Work
Genre: Alternative Universe - Kingdom, Gen, I’m new to archive so I’m not very good at tagging yet, Kingdom au for my ocs, Mystery, Witchcraft, ocs Being idiots
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-21
Updated: 2019-04-21
Packaged: 2020-01-23 15:41:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,561
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18552772
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ankala/pseuds/Ankala
Summary: When weird happenings are occurring throughout the kingdom, Queen Samantha has a guess at who the cause could be. As much as she hoped it isn’t the case, it must be checked out. Hoping for a diplomatic meeting, she sends her kind younger brother, Prince Nico, to check it out, along with his friend, a knight in training named Lennan.





	Wish Upon A Witch

**Author's Note:**

> This is completely an au for my ocs. None of them are what they would actually be.

Samantha was always trying to make Nico stronger. He really wasn’t much of a fighter, the opposite of what was expected of a prince like himself. Not being in line for the throne, like his sister, means that he needs to find other ways to make up his weight in the kingdom, but the only option he had was training to be a great knight for the kingdom. But fighting really wasn’t his forte.  
If there was a job within the kingdom suited for a prince that involved music or just being overly kind to others, he would be perfect for it. So many people he’d met would compare him to an angel with his heavenly musical talents and his overwhelming caring for others. But he was a prince, so his job was expected to be so much more regal and noble than an entertainer, or any of the supporting jobs.  
And thus, he was expected to become a knight. 

The prince was helping his best friend and sister’s lady in waiting, Min, carry stuff across the castle, when a servant approached them. He was informed that his sister wanted to speak to him. He looked to his friend to make sure she would be fine on her own, which was met with a smile. “Good luck, don’t die,” She said, as she took a box from him, putting it on top of her own, before changing position to hold the boxes in one hand, to jokingly pat him on the back. She gave him one more smile before moving on to continue her work.  
Nico turned to go to his sister’s room. She immediately greeted him upon his entrance, but she didn’t look up from the document she was holding in her hands, and her expression held a grimace.  
“Hey sis, you, uh, called?”  
“Yes,” she paused, as if considering her next words carefully. “I,” Another pause. “I need your help. I know knightley duties aren’t really your thing, but unfortunately you have to get used to them. But,” She paused once more. “That isn’t my only reason for calling you.”  
She finally looked up at him, as if waiting for confirmation that he was following her words. “Um, right, so, uh, what exactly is it you are, uh,” he had to take a second to think of the word, “enlisting my help with?” He winced a little. Why did he have to be so awkward? This was his sister he was talking to, this shouldn’t be so difficult.  
“Well, I’m sure you’ve heard by now about the… problems spreading throughout the kingdom.”  
And of course, she was right. “You mean the stolen merchandise?” This was the talk of the whole kingdom lately. At night, stores were losing some of their items, vanished into thin air. Anything from valuable magical items, to things as simple as food. Nothing his sister was doing was working, not even having people on constant watch around the kingdom. It was impossible to have an eye on every object, so the vanished object were disappearing once someone looked away. He knew paranoia was beginning to spread, and his sister was at her wits end, but he had no idea how she expected him of all people to help.  
She gave him a solemn nod. “It’s… it’s gotten worse.”  
His expression changed to one of shock, staring at her. “What? How? Did something happen?”  
She turned to stare at him. He recognized the exhaustion on her face. This was really tearing her apart. She sighed and looked forward, but up, rather than continuing to stare at whatever documents she was reading, what he could only assume had to do with the situation she was dealing with. She finally answered his question. “Three people disappeared last night,” before he could give voice to his dismay, she continued “Three normal people, with families and no room for secrets. Only one of them even knew magic, and it was simple telekinesis they used to help with around the house chores.”  
“Three people? Was there any connection between them? Or with any of the missing items?”  
She sighed again, pinching the bridge of her nose. “Not a thing. They didn’t even know each other.” She turned her face towards him again. “Listen. It’s obvious that this is magic based, but I have no idea who would do this. There’s only one person I know with this kind of power, but I don’t know why she would do this. I thought we were on fine terms, but…” Her face saddened even more than it had yet. “I fear I may be wrong.” She turned to completely face him. “That’s why I need you. There’s a witch who lives just on the border of the kingdom. Her name is Areli, and I need you to find out what she knows about this. She may not be the kindest, most trusting woman in the land, but my hope is that not even she can resist your virtue. I want you to go speak to her. Take your friend, the one training to be a knight. I’d go myself or send one of my experienced knights, but I fear she will not take that well, and I must stay here to take care of my people.”  
“A, uh, a witch?” She stared at him. “And you want me to go handle this? With Lennan?”  
His sister raised an eyebrow. “Yes? Is this a problem?” She didn’t seem angry, but he assumed she wouldn’t be happy if he disagreed. She really had no idea how to handle this problem, and he guessed she was trying to kill two birds with one stone by giving him better practice as a knight. He was rather nervous about the idea of dealing with an angry witch, but atleast with his friend by his side, he wouldn’t be in as much danger.  
“No, no, not at all. Does Lennan already know or…”  
“No, you should go inform him now, and you will leave first thing tomorrow morning” She commanded, as she turned back towards the table in front of her and sat down. She dismissed him to do as she told, but before he could exit, she stopped him to say one last thing. “And brother?” He turned back to face her, and she turned her head towards him one more time, “Please, do be careful.”  
He smiled, “Of course, Sammy.” She gave him a small smile back, the best expression he had gotten from her the entire duration of the conversation. And with that, their ‘meeting’ was over, and he left to go talk to his friend.  
Nico had to do some asking around to find Lennan, but his sister Irene was located in the stables as usual, and she always seemed to know where her brother was. He was glad to find the knight to be in Min’s room, holding a conversation with her. Nico wanted to get to tell her where he was going, as she always knew what to say in response to his nervousness, and he would feel bad if he left before getting the chance to talk to her. Min welcomed him into her room with open arms. “Nico, thank god you’re here. I need a person to legitimately play chess with. I’ve been explaining it to him for years, and yet Lennan still has no idea what he’s doing.”  
“Well excuse me, Min, we can’t all be super smart like you.” Both of his friends glared at each other, but neither were very good at being intimidating. Knowing they weren’t going to get anywhere, Min quickly turned back to Nico  
“So, you wanna play?”  
He smiled back at her. “Of course, but I’ve gotta talk to Lenn while we play. My sister has assigned us a mission.” If Lennan had been drinking something, Nico was sure he would have spit it out.  
“I’m sorry, but your sister assigned you and I a mission? Like, called me by name, said I was to accompany you.”  
“Well, not exactly by name, but by description. We’re gonna go talk to a witch.” Lennan went pale. “A witch? You and I? Against a witch? How powerful of a witch? Wait, your sister asked for me specifically to accompany you specifically on mission to go fight a witch?”  
Lennan’s fear was not misplaced. The knight was still a rather awkward fighter and Nico was absolutely horrid at fighting: he couldn’t even win against a brand new knight trying hard to go easy on him then win. Nico went to sit down as he continued talking, Min doing the same, turning the chess board and resetting all the pieces. “We’re not supposed to fight her. Sam just wants us to talk to her, see if she know anything about all the stolen items from recently. The plan is for us to talk to her, see if she can and will tell us anything, and then take that information back to my sister for her to use in the investigation.”  
Ceri’s complexion regained some color, and he relaxed slightly, but he was still clearly nervous.  
Min took this moment to join the conversation, as she took one of his pawns with her knight. “Man, I sure wish I didn’t have so many other duties. This sounds so fun, I wanna come with.”  
“I’m not really sure fun is the word to describe it, Min,” Nico replied.  
She looked up, glancing from Nico to Ceri and then back to Nico again, a smirk evident on her face. “Honestly, I think both of you boys need someone like me to join you. Either that, or one of you have to get a backbone.”  
Lennan puffed out his chest, trying to make himself look stronger and bigger than he actually was. “Oh shut up Min. I can be tough when I want to be, and you know it.”  
The girl snorted, “Yeah, sure, you’ll be tough the day I’m the tallest out of the three of us.”  
“Hey! I’m gonna be the Captain of the Royal Guard one day, just you wait. Don’t compare what I’m working hard for to an impossible thing that’ll never happen for you..”  
Min gave an offended gasp. “How dare you! I’ll have you know that I grew a whole quarter of an inch in the last month. I continue at this rate, and in like, what, 56 months, I’ll be as tall as you.”  
“Keep dreaming, shortstack.”  
Nico laughed, and as the night went on with his friends, he stopped worrying about his assignment.  
Nico woke the next morning to a persistent tapping on his door. “Your Highness? Your Highness?” He heard someone calling to him. He was always a morning person, so it wasn’t that hard for him to get up. He opened the door to find Lennan waiting outside of it. Lennan was the opposite of a morning person, so he still looked half dead as he informed Nico that everything was prepared for their departure, and that he had an hour to get ready to leave before they began their quest.  
Nico was upset to only get to see his sister for a moment before leaving, but he knew she was busy, and most likely exhausted, so he couldn’t blame her when their only interaction was a quick hug and a wishing of luck.  
He joined Lennan in mounting their horses as his friend finished his goodbye to his sister. He was rattling off a list of duties for his sister to take care of while he was gone. The girl didn’t seem to want to hear it, as she tried to rush the list with a series of ‘okay, okay, I got it, I got it.’ Lennan got the message rather late, but did rush the end of his list, before turning to Nico, smiling, and saying “So, you ready to go get murdered by a witch?”  
Leave it to Lennan to attempt to laugh off their impending doom.  
The ride to the witch’s shelter was only meant to be 2 days, but their bad luck meant a thunderstorm right near the end of the first day, stopping their travel that day way too early, extending the whole trip by a whole additional half a day, meaning another night that they had to stay at some uncomfortable inn. They hadn’t even met the witch yet, and they already had the worst of luck.  
The Captain of the Royal Guard had explained the witch’s home rather well to Nico before they left. It wasn’t a cave really, because it was shaped like a house, but it was hidden by magic within a mountain, where one could find it if they knew where to look without triggering one of her traps.  
So obviously the two had triggered a trap. One could truly place the blame on Lennan, but Nico prefered not to force one person to take all the guilt.. Nico had given a quick warning just as Lennan reached for the wall they suspected to secretly be the door, but he wasn’t fast enough, and, honestly, he should have gone more in depth about what the Captain had told him on the way up, but oh well, too late now. They were stuck by the paralysis magic until it either wore off, or the witch found them. Nico wasn’t sure which he’d prefer. Being completely vulnerable and left to the witch’s mercy wasn’t the optimal situation for when they met her, but who knew how long they’d be stuck until it wore off. He didn’t know that much about magic, but he did know some of the strongest magics could last weeks at a time.  
“Well, well, well, what do we have here?” Guess the witch finding them came first. “You two trying to break into my house? Honestly, just cause I’m a witch doesn’t mean it's not criminal to try to rob me or whatever your plans are. I could have you arrested for this, you know.” He couldn’t move his head to turn to look at Ceri, but he could see him out of the corner of his eye. They made eye contact, but neither knew what to say. “Well? You’re not gonna try to explain yourselves? Beg and plead for your lives? Try to convince me you’re two mountain climbers and that’s all you’re doing here? If you’re not, at least tell me that so I don’t sit here and wait for you to talk before I kill you.”  
Nico finally decided to speak up. “Listen, I’m not here to do anything bad to you. I’m the prince of this kingdom. I think you know my sister, Sammy- Samantha Alvarez, the Queen? We’re just here to ask if you know anything about some problems that have been occuring. We don’t want trouble.”  
“Yeah,” Lennan agreed, “So like, please don’t kill us?”  
There were moments of just silence, before the woman behind them burst out into… laughter? “Yeah, no duh. I know exactly who you are, Nico Alvarez, Lennan Bryna. I’m just messing with you.”  
“Umm…” Nico had no idea how to respond.  
“You’re here to ask me about the disappearing items and people throughout the land, right? Your sister fears I’ve had some part to play in this?” She laughed again, “What a fool she is. She knows better than anyone else that I won’t waste my time messing around when it’s only going to get me in trouble. Why would I steal a bunch of random stuff from around the kingdom, when I’ve got everything I need right here? Solitude, overwhelming magic power, food, water, and a place to sleep.”  
“Wait, so you know all about the problems? Do you know who is causing them? What their purpose is?” Nico needed this girl to know something, his sister depended on it.  
“Sorry to disappoint, but I only know because you’re not the first ones to blame me. Of course I’ve had a mob from the surrounding villages at my doorstep. When are people going to get it into their thick skulls that just because someone is different or better than them, it doesn’t mean they’re evil.” ‘Better than them,’ she had said. Nico couldn’t help but notice how cocky this woman was, but she definitely didn’t seem inherently evil. Maybe this woman was right. But Sam seemed legitimately worried this woman was behind all the chaos throughout the kingdom, why would she if she knew this witch as well as the witch implied?  
“Listen, Miss Areli.”  
“Yes?”  
“I really do believe that you didn’t do this.” He could see Lennan’s shocked change in expression out of the corner of his eye.  
“You do?” Lennan attempted to whisper to Nico. “How?”  
“You realize that I can hear you perfectly right?”  
Before Lennan could get himself into more trouble, Nico continued. “But we really need your help. We know this has to be magic based, and you clearly know your way around magic. Maybe if you could come take a look, you could help us figure out the problem.” He was veering so far off of what his sister had asked of him. He could tell from the worry she displayed at the mere mention of this woman’s name that Samantha had no want to bring her to the castle. But Nico knew just from being in the witch’s presence that she was powerful enough to be helpful.  
She laughed again, “ And tell me just why I should do that?”  
Nico had no idea what to offer her. From what she had said earlier, it was obvious gold wasn’t going to cut it. “Uhh, Well…”  
“Ha, you have absolutely no idea what to offer me. Apologies, but I don’t do favors for people. Hate to do this to you, well, not really, but you are on your own with this.” As she finished turning him down, she removed the paralysis charm on the two.  
Nico finally got to turn to meet the woman face to face. He froze once more though as he was met with the most beautiful eyes he had ever seen. They were a dark purple in color, which matched the long locks of the woman’s hair, which were only a slightly lighter shade. She stared directly back at him, almost seeming as lost in his eyes as he was in hers. She had one of the most expressive faces he had ever seen, displaying her shock powerfully. She was obviously taken aback as they looked at each other, and she hesitated before struggling out her next words, all of her previous arrogance gone, as she shifted her gaze to the ground.  
“I-...” She stopped that sentence, before regaining some of her confidence. “You’re lucky I’m feeling nice and that I feel bad for you travelling all the way out here. I will let you stay here until morning.” She made a motion with her hand and the door appeared behind them, “And then you will leave. I’ll even take a little bit of time to look through my spell books, I’ll see if I can find a spell similar to the one that’s causing all these problems. Other than that, you’re on your own.”  
Ceri and Nico looked at each other before looking back at her. “I, uh,” Nico stuttered,“Thank you. It’s very kind of you, ma’am.”  
She scoffed, before pushing passed them to enter her home. They exchanged glances once more before following suit.  
Staying in the witch’s house was rather awkward.  
Nico expected her to use magic to summon food for dinner, but was surprised when she began to pull out ingredients and cutting some up to put all together. Ceri and Nico both just stood in the doorway, not knowing what the polite thing to do would be. Areli gave them both a raised eyebrow, before calling out for them to sit down.  
They sat in awkward silence for minutes, before the witch finally spoke. “So your sister must be feeling careless to send you two out to meet me. If she thought I might be attacking her kingdom, how could she expect you two to stand up to me?”  
Neither wanted this witch to know how frightened they truly were to meet her. “I’ll have you know that I’m training to be a knight, and I’m a lot stronger and tougher than I look.”  
Areli turned to give him a look that said ‘Really?’ “Your armor isn’t even strapped on right.” Both boys looked at Lennan to realize that, yeah his armor was definitely wrong. A few of the straps weren’t even strapped at all.  
The woman’s cooking was a lot better than Nico would have expected, but he really would have thought someone like her would use magic for everything. After dinner, she commanded Lennan to go get some firewood for her. Lennan begrudgingly agreed, but was clearly not happy to leave Nico alone with the witch.  
Once Lennan was gone, she turned towards the small shelf in the back of the room, filled with old looking books. She pulled one out and began to flip through it, the pages old and faded, but still well put together. They fell into the least awkward silence yet. Nico had no idea why he felt the need to break it, but suddenly he was talking without even thinking. “So, how do you know my sister so well?” She looked up from the book at him, before looking back down at it. He wouldn’t blame her for just completely ignoring his question, it was dumb of him to ask-  
“I helped her defeat a monster terrorizing a village, and she helped me find a stolen book.” She said, still looking down at the book in her hands.  
“Oh. Well, I’m surprised I never heard of you before recently.”  
Another long pause before her answer. “I’m not. We may have been friendly when we were working together, but we didn’t exactly part on the best of terms. She wanted me to come work for the kingdom, but, well, let’s just say I don’t exactly have the best reputation with your family. I’ve never actually wronged them, but my uncaring towards their problems never made any of them all too happy.”  
“Oh, well, I’m sorry about that.”  
“Honestly, when you’ve dealt with royalty for as long as I have, it becomes better when you no longer have to deal with them.”  
She didn’t seem to be enjoying this conversation. Nico had no idea if he should continue talking, or just leave them to sit in silence. But, before he knew it, he was talking without thinking again. “So, uh, purple hair? How is that possible? I mean, my friend Min has red streaks in her hair, but that’s not her natural color. It comes from a mix of magic and dyes from plants,” He realized he’d asked a question but then started rambling. “So, uh, is your’s natural or dyed?”  
“I’m a witch, we’re born with inherit natural magical abilities. We basically have it flowing through our veins. My magic is of a purple aura. The purple is from the magic staining it.”  
“Purple magic, huh? That must look pretty.”  
Her face lit up with a smirk. “Wanna see?”  
He looked at her in shock and stuttered, surprised she would offer. She waited for an answer. “Yes.” He said with more confidence than he expected. “That sounds great.”  
She smiled wider, and held up her hand. It glowed purple, and a flow of magic pushed toward him, a beautiful and elegant purple color. The magic lit up a beautiful pattern in the air between them. He smiled and looked on in awe at how glamorous her magic appeared.  
“Amazing,” He said smiling at her. “Your magic is so cool.”  
“Oh please, if you think that’s cool, let me tell you about the time I took down a hydra. You’d be surprised what kind of spells and potions you can make with scales from those things.” And with that, she began to delve into so many wondrous stories about her adventures over the years.  
They laughed as she finished telling him a story of knight from the Sestral Kingdom who thought he could defeat a dragon better than she could, and how angry he was when she showed him up.  
Areli turned toward the window. “Your friend is on his way back here.”  
“You can tell?” She gave him a look, as if to say ‘What do you think?’ “Right, all powerful magic. Of course you can see what’s going on around your house. I really do think your magic is amazing, Miss Areli”  
“Aery,” She said.  
“Hmm?” He didn’t realize what she was saying.  
“That’s what you should call me. My full name is too much, especially with the miss. My… friends call me Aery.” He stared at her for calling him a friend, but Lennan entered the house before he could say anything.  
Areli.. Aery stood up quickly rushing over to Lennan. “Great, you’ve got the wood.” She waved a hand and a purple aura surrounded the wood as it moved out of Lennan’s arms and into the fire place. She then snapped and a fire lit on top of it, purple at first before turning to the usual orange.  
Lennan opened his mouth to say something, but Aery cut him off first. “Alright, now that we’ve got warmth for the night, we can go to bed. I’m going to my bedroom, you two can figure out how you want to sleep in here. Night, sleep tight.” She left before either could respond. They both looked at each other for a moment, confused, before moving past the strange interaction, and deciding where to sleep.  
Nico slept much better in this stranger’s house then he ever would have expected.  
The next morning, he woke up to movement in the kitchen. Aery was humming to herself as she appeared to be making breakfast. He looked next to him to see Lennan still asleep, as to be expected.  
He offered up a greeting to the witch. “Morning.”  
She smiled back, “Same to you. Sleep well?”  
“Yeah.”  
“You should probably get your friend up. We’ve got quite the trip to make today.”  
Aery was right. Now hopefully this time, it would be the expected two day trip-  
Wait.  
We?  
“I- You-” He stuttered out the question. “You’re coming with us?”  
“Yeah, why not. I slept on it, realized it’d probably get those villagers off my back, maybe they’ll leave me alone.” She paused, “Besides, it’ll be nice to see my old friend. We may not have been the perfect match, but Sammy and I did spend quite some time together. Plus, I need to yell at her for ever considering I was the one behind this.” He opened his mouth to speak, “Don’t say anything, no matter what she said or what you say now, I know she was worried it was me. And don’t even think about thanking me. I’m doing this for me, and me alone. Not for anyone else.”  
Nico shut his mouth, but continued to smile. Perhaps this will be a lot more fun than he expected. 

And off to save his home they went.


End file.
